Q. We renovated in 2005, and the new kitchen/breakfast room got brick that was a good match with the rest of the house. Now, however, the brick has long cracks running up and down near the corners and white, chalky stains everywhere, and some cement between the brick has come loose. The rest of the house has the same thing, though we didn’t really notice it as much until this happened. We got estimates, and some brick people want to take all the brick down and start over. This seems extreme. What can we do to avoid this?
A. Move. What you described is too common in residential construction. I rarely see similar conditions in commercial work, mainly because commercial projects have technically trained bricklayers and management that know how to properly install the “system.”
That’s right, like every part of any building, brick construction is a system. For decades I’ve observed residential brickwork placed incorrectly, right against the exterior wall, with no air space. The problem is that placing brick right against waterproofed walls traps moisture, in the form of vapor, liquid or solid (when ice crystals form). Trapped moisture is part of what you are seeing.
The other problems are caused by not providing a way for the moisture to naturally get out or for the whole wall to move without pushing against itself like a logjam trying to relieve pressure. The choked wall is pushing moisture, and lime or calcium from the mortar, out through joints, which is what that chalky substance is. Every material is subject to water and movement, whether inside or outside the building. Inside it’s mostly humidity that works on materials, unless you have leaking.